Everybody's 'my monument'
Sunday, 6 December 2009
Maswood Alam Khan
If you ever visit Barisal your local host, or the receptionist of the hotel you have boarded at, may fumble with the buttons of his shirt if you ask him to find for you some places of interest you may like to visit. They fumble because in and around Barisal town there is not a single tourism spot one can really shout about.
But of late, hosts in Barisal nag their guests to visit "Baitul Aman Jame Masjid & Idgah Complex", popularly known as "Guthia Masjid", a new grand mosque that may impress a tourist. Indeed, Guthia Masjid and the adjuncts to its complex will keep you captivated if you ever visit the spot.
Located in Uzirpur Upazilla, which is only a 30-minute drive from Barisal town, the mosque is perhaps the best tourist attraction in Barisal from the architectural point of view. Everyday about 200 visitors -- and not less than 1,000 every Friday -- visit the complex not only to pray inside the palatial mosque but also to stroll around the adjacent compound of 14 acres of landscape. The mosque having 7,000 square feet floor area can accommodate up to 1,500 Muslim devotees at a time for any prayer.
The mosque faces a big lake. A beautifully designed flight of stairs, reinforced embankment with squares of tiles on the western side of the lake, open lounge around the lake with concrete benches, and other architectural features are enlaced by shading trees and conifers to offer a visitor a serene respite from the suffocating heat on a summer day.
A paved Idgah ground facing a 'Mihrab' (a niche indicating the direction of Mecca) and a high wall decorated with a mosaic of excerpts quoted from the Holy Quran in embedded calligraphy can accommodate not less than 10,000 devotees to have their Eid Prayer.
An orphanage of 5,000 square feet floor area with a capacity for 100 orphans is also annexed with the complex where already quite a number of orphans are being given free food, boarding and education based on Islamic disciplines.
Every morning the orphanage vibrates with tumultuous and full-throated chants of parentless children reciting passages from the Holy Quran all at a time resulting in a cacophonous chorus of young voices that should evoke your childhood memory when perhaps you as a child also learnt those lessons by rote under tutelage of a 'Hujur' (religion teacher).
At one corner of the complex is a decently manicured compound earmarked for burial grounds in two sections, one for males and the other for females. Guarded by a fence, a small patch of land on the bank of the lake is designated for future burial of the man and his wife, who spent their fortunes to build the complex---in other words, to leave an imprint for their progenies.
From the hidden loudspeakers atop the 162-foot tall ornamental minaret of the mosque reedy and lugubrious voice of a muezzin reciting 'Azan" wafts across the open surroundings, traveling as far as three miles away, to invite Muslim devotees for prayers.
Mr. S. Sharfuddin Ahmed Shantu, aged 65, reportedly a businessman in export-import trades, had spent more than Taka 100 million (10 crore) from his personal fund and took almost three years to build the complex and made it open for public use in 2006.
Spending money for legacies seems to be a passion of Mr. Shantu. Besides the mosque complex, he spent his personal fund to establish three colleges and a dozen of philanthropic organizations in and around Guthia, the village he was born in.
Not far away from the complex is a nice two-storey yellow bungalow where Mr. Shantu stays whenever he takes a break from his business in Dhaka. He relishes from his main bedroom the panorama of the complex through a wide window facing the mosque. During my last visit to "Guthia Masjid" I asked the Supervising Engineer of the Complex Mohammad Faruq, "Why and how did Mr. Shantu spend so much money for the complex?" Instead of answering my question, Mr. Faruq rather questioned me: "Why and how did Emperor Shahjahan spend so much money for Taj Mahal?"
Once while buying peanuts I asked Badal, a vendor familiar to me for a long time, why did he wish to construct his 'dream house' so abnormally tall? Faruq said: "Sir, the makeshift hut in the slum area where I have been living for the last six years has a low roof that debars me from standing my full height. Never ever could I stand inside my room with my head high. My dream now is to live in a spacious room with a high ceiling where I can stand comfortably and where my children can jump and play.
My tall house has to be taller than the tallest coconut tree in my village."
Badal was a street vendor of peanuts and his favourite spot for selling his merchandise in the evening was by the shaded lane at the northern foot of "Tin Netaar Mazar" (the mausoleum of three national leaders: Sher-e-Bangla A K Fazlul Huq, Hussain Shahid Suhrawardy & Khaja Nazimuddin) near 'Doel Chattar', in Dhaka. Everyday after my rounds of evening walk in Suhrawardy Uddyan I used to buy peanuts from Badal on my way back home.
One evening, by happenstance I found a few lottery tickets of Diabetic Association stashed inside his cash pouch. The Diabetic Association promised to award Taka 2.5 million as the first prize. I asked Badal what he would do if, by a stroke of luck, he got the first prize! Without waiting for a second he answered: 'a five-story building at his village home which must be as tall as the 'the mausoleum of three national leaders' he watches everyday.
I could not know whether Badal did ever climb the ladder of his dream at least to stand comfortably inside his abode or all his dreams got fizzled out into smoke.
In 1943, Abraham Maslow in a paper titled "A Theory of Human Motivation" proposed his famous "Hierarchy of Needs" theory described in a diagram like the pyramid with its upside down that explained human needs: Physiological needs, Safety needs, Love/Belonging/Social needs, Esteem needs, Cognitive needs, Aesthetic needs and lastly Growth needs like Self-actualization or Self-transcendence. His theory contends that as humans meet 'basic needs', they seek to satisfy successively 'higher needs'.
The only battle we humans lose is the battle of conquering death. If men could cheat death and be immortal, the top stratum of Maslow's reverse pyramid would have been marked with the phrase "Needs of living"---or, if living would have become boring, with the phrase "Needs of Dying".
Throughout ages scientists are spending the prime time of their life inside research laboratories to register their names in the history of science. A young man suddenly decides to remain a lifelong bachelor to immortalize his love for a girl that remained unrequited. A young Christian unexpectedly makes his mind up to choose celibacy to fulfill his mission on this earth. Many even embrace death to be immortal.
Alexander Fleming still lives in his invention of penicillin, a kind of monument of his own. Works of Shamsur Rahman, the poet, will never be consigned to oblivion as long as we Bengalese will not forget our mother tongue.
Like all the artists and scientists, Rezwana Chowdhury Bannya is also attempting to immortalize herself through singing Tagore songs in her own style, in her inimitable husky tone, in her unique melodious voice with her forehead periodically furrowing, her lips breathlessly twitching and quivering and her both hands undulating in the air in synch with the rhymes---constantly enlivening the gemlike words Rabindranath Tagore so adoringly had chosen to weave his literary garlands with tuneful assonance.
And those who cannot afford to be a Fleming or a Shamsur Rahman or a Bannya look for alternative pathways to leave behind their marks on this earth for their progenies to reminisce. Artisans leave behind their handcrafts, folksingers their folklores, snake charmers their tricks, and quacks their quackeries.
Elephants leave their hoof marks for their next generations to tread on. Landowners in villages also make attempts to immortalize their heredity by planting long-living trees and by registering their names in the latest journals of land record volumes.
Shah Jahan, the Emperor of Mughal Empire, shopped around for ideas to immortalize his love and legacy after his second wife Mumtaz Mahal died, in 1631, during the birth of their daughter Gauhara Begum. Shah Jahan perhaps marveled at the architectural beauty of the Itmad-Ud-Daulah's Tomb (sometimes called the Baby Taj) and replicated the mogul building in his own grand monument: Taj Mahal.
Mr. S. Sharfuddin Ahmed Shantu of Guthia perhaps gaped in awe at the white marbles of Taj Mahal during a visit to Delhi and made an attempt to replicate the wonder in his own Guthia Masjid in Uzirpur.
Peanut retailer Badal would undoubtedly have mimicked the height of 'the mausoleum of three national leaders' in his five-storey dream building, if only he won the first prize of the lottery floated by Diabetic Association.
We believe that we can achieve immortality through our acts and achievements that we leave behind for our future generations to remember. We also believe in immortalizing ourselves by leaving behind offspring, a kind of immortality via evolution. Those who remain lifelong bachelors or celebrates cannot leave behind their offspring; but they leave behind a legacy in the form of celibacy, a noble monument of their choice.
Leaving offspring is not the only mode of immortality. According to the theory of evolution even one single hair left on this earth is a thread by which a living being lives perpetually in this world. "You never really quite die, as long as there is some of your genetic material left behind in this world", theorized Richard Dawkins in his book "The Selfish Gene".
Everybody, nevertheless, wishes to leave behind his/her "My Taj Mahal" before bidding adieu to this world!
The writer is a banker. He can be reached at e-mail:
maswood@hotmail.com
If you ever visit Barisal your local host, or the receptionist of the hotel you have boarded at, may fumble with the buttons of his shirt if you ask him to find for you some places of interest you may like to visit. They fumble because in and around Barisal town there is not a single tourism spot one can really shout about.
But of late, hosts in Barisal nag their guests to visit "Baitul Aman Jame Masjid & Idgah Complex", popularly known as "Guthia Masjid", a new grand mosque that may impress a tourist. Indeed, Guthia Masjid and the adjuncts to its complex will keep you captivated if you ever visit the spot.
Located in Uzirpur Upazilla, which is only a 30-minute drive from Barisal town, the mosque is perhaps the best tourist attraction in Barisal from the architectural point of view. Everyday about 200 visitors -- and not less than 1,000 every Friday -- visit the complex not only to pray inside the palatial mosque but also to stroll around the adjacent compound of 14 acres of landscape. The mosque having 7,000 square feet floor area can accommodate up to 1,500 Muslim devotees at a time for any prayer.
The mosque faces a big lake. A beautifully designed flight of stairs, reinforced embankment with squares of tiles on the western side of the lake, open lounge around the lake with concrete benches, and other architectural features are enlaced by shading trees and conifers to offer a visitor a serene respite from the suffocating heat on a summer day.
A paved Idgah ground facing a 'Mihrab' (a niche indicating the direction of Mecca) and a high wall decorated with a mosaic of excerpts quoted from the Holy Quran in embedded calligraphy can accommodate not less than 10,000 devotees to have their Eid Prayer.
An orphanage of 5,000 square feet floor area with a capacity for 100 orphans is also annexed with the complex where already quite a number of orphans are being given free food, boarding and education based on Islamic disciplines.
Every morning the orphanage vibrates with tumultuous and full-throated chants of parentless children reciting passages from the Holy Quran all at a time resulting in a cacophonous chorus of young voices that should evoke your childhood memory when perhaps you as a child also learnt those lessons by rote under tutelage of a 'Hujur' (religion teacher).
At one corner of the complex is a decently manicured compound earmarked for burial grounds in two sections, one for males and the other for females. Guarded by a fence, a small patch of land on the bank of the lake is designated for future burial of the man and his wife, who spent their fortunes to build the complex---in other words, to leave an imprint for their progenies.
From the hidden loudspeakers atop the 162-foot tall ornamental minaret of the mosque reedy and lugubrious voice of a muezzin reciting 'Azan" wafts across the open surroundings, traveling as far as three miles away, to invite Muslim devotees for prayers.
Mr. S. Sharfuddin Ahmed Shantu, aged 65, reportedly a businessman in export-import trades, had spent more than Taka 100 million (10 crore) from his personal fund and took almost three years to build the complex and made it open for public use in 2006.
Spending money for legacies seems to be a passion of Mr. Shantu. Besides the mosque complex, he spent his personal fund to establish three colleges and a dozen of philanthropic organizations in and around Guthia, the village he was born in.
Not far away from the complex is a nice two-storey yellow bungalow where Mr. Shantu stays whenever he takes a break from his business in Dhaka. He relishes from his main bedroom the panorama of the complex through a wide window facing the mosque. During my last visit to "Guthia Masjid" I asked the Supervising Engineer of the Complex Mohammad Faruq, "Why and how did Mr. Shantu spend so much money for the complex?" Instead of answering my question, Mr. Faruq rather questioned me: "Why and how did Emperor Shahjahan spend so much money for Taj Mahal?"
Once while buying peanuts I asked Badal, a vendor familiar to me for a long time, why did he wish to construct his 'dream house' so abnormally tall? Faruq said: "Sir, the makeshift hut in the slum area where I have been living for the last six years has a low roof that debars me from standing my full height. Never ever could I stand inside my room with my head high. My dream now is to live in a spacious room with a high ceiling where I can stand comfortably and where my children can jump and play.
My tall house has to be taller than the tallest coconut tree in my village."
Badal was a street vendor of peanuts and his favourite spot for selling his merchandise in the evening was by the shaded lane at the northern foot of "Tin Netaar Mazar" (the mausoleum of three national leaders: Sher-e-Bangla A K Fazlul Huq, Hussain Shahid Suhrawardy & Khaja Nazimuddin) near 'Doel Chattar', in Dhaka. Everyday after my rounds of evening walk in Suhrawardy Uddyan I used to buy peanuts from Badal on my way back home.
One evening, by happenstance I found a few lottery tickets of Diabetic Association stashed inside his cash pouch. The Diabetic Association promised to award Taka 2.5 million as the first prize. I asked Badal what he would do if, by a stroke of luck, he got the first prize! Without waiting for a second he answered: 'a five-story building at his village home which must be as tall as the 'the mausoleum of three national leaders' he watches everyday.
I could not know whether Badal did ever climb the ladder of his dream at least to stand comfortably inside his abode or all his dreams got fizzled out into smoke.
In 1943, Abraham Maslow in a paper titled "A Theory of Human Motivation" proposed his famous "Hierarchy of Needs" theory described in a diagram like the pyramid with its upside down that explained human needs: Physiological needs, Safety needs, Love/Belonging/Social needs, Esteem needs, Cognitive needs, Aesthetic needs and lastly Growth needs like Self-actualization or Self-transcendence. His theory contends that as humans meet 'basic needs', they seek to satisfy successively 'higher needs'.
The only battle we humans lose is the battle of conquering death. If men could cheat death and be immortal, the top stratum of Maslow's reverse pyramid would have been marked with the phrase "Needs of living"---or, if living would have become boring, with the phrase "Needs of Dying".
Throughout ages scientists are spending the prime time of their life inside research laboratories to register their names in the history of science. A young man suddenly decides to remain a lifelong bachelor to immortalize his love for a girl that remained unrequited. A young Christian unexpectedly makes his mind up to choose celibacy to fulfill his mission on this earth. Many even embrace death to be immortal.
Alexander Fleming still lives in his invention of penicillin, a kind of monument of his own. Works of Shamsur Rahman, the poet, will never be consigned to oblivion as long as we Bengalese will not forget our mother tongue.
Like all the artists and scientists, Rezwana Chowdhury Bannya is also attempting to immortalize herself through singing Tagore songs in her own style, in her inimitable husky tone, in her unique melodious voice with her forehead periodically furrowing, her lips breathlessly twitching and quivering and her both hands undulating in the air in synch with the rhymes---constantly enlivening the gemlike words Rabindranath Tagore so adoringly had chosen to weave his literary garlands with tuneful assonance.
And those who cannot afford to be a Fleming or a Shamsur Rahman or a Bannya look for alternative pathways to leave behind their marks on this earth for their progenies to reminisce. Artisans leave behind their handcrafts, folksingers their folklores, snake charmers their tricks, and quacks their quackeries.
Elephants leave their hoof marks for their next generations to tread on. Landowners in villages also make attempts to immortalize their heredity by planting long-living trees and by registering their names in the latest journals of land record volumes.
Shah Jahan, the Emperor of Mughal Empire, shopped around for ideas to immortalize his love and legacy after his second wife Mumtaz Mahal died, in 1631, during the birth of their daughter Gauhara Begum. Shah Jahan perhaps marveled at the architectural beauty of the Itmad-Ud-Daulah's Tomb (sometimes called the Baby Taj) and replicated the mogul building in his own grand monument: Taj Mahal.
Mr. S. Sharfuddin Ahmed Shantu of Guthia perhaps gaped in awe at the white marbles of Taj Mahal during a visit to Delhi and made an attempt to replicate the wonder in his own Guthia Masjid in Uzirpur.
Peanut retailer Badal would undoubtedly have mimicked the height of 'the mausoleum of three national leaders' in his five-storey dream building, if only he won the first prize of the lottery floated by Diabetic Association.
We believe that we can achieve immortality through our acts and achievements that we leave behind for our future generations to remember. We also believe in immortalizing ourselves by leaving behind offspring, a kind of immortality via evolution. Those who remain lifelong bachelors or celebrates cannot leave behind their offspring; but they leave behind a legacy in the form of celibacy, a noble monument of their choice.
Leaving offspring is not the only mode of immortality. According to the theory of evolution even one single hair left on this earth is a thread by which a living being lives perpetually in this world. "You never really quite die, as long as there is some of your genetic material left behind in this world", theorized Richard Dawkins in his book "The Selfish Gene".
Everybody, nevertheless, wishes to leave behind his/her "My Taj Mahal" before bidding adieu to this world!
The writer is a banker. He can be reached at e-mail:
maswood@hotmail.com